The Montreal Critics’ Week has unveiled the lineup for its inaugural festival, which will feature 19 films across a week of programming. The first-ever edition, an initiative of the Montreal-based online magazine Panorama-cinéma, will be held at the Cinémathèque québécoise and Cinéma Moderne from Jan. 13 to Jan. 19. Along with Q&As with select filmmakers and talent, more guest speakers will be announced at a later date.
The program includes the world premiere of “Two Cuckolds Go Swimming,” a Canadian production that marks the sophomore feature of director Winston DeGiobbi. The film follows an adult film star who re-examines her life during a visit to her mother.
The festival will close with a double feature of Matthew Rankin’s Farsi-language fantasia “Universal Language,” which was recently featured on the Oscars shortlist of potential nominees for the best international feature film category, followed by the North American premiere of Abdolreza Kahani’s “A Shrine,” which follows a mechanic living among the Iranian community of Quebec.
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“This new event opens on a cliché: that film criticism – and by extension film critics – may be too demanding, elitist, disgruntled, or obsolete. And yet, film criticism also endeavors to define new trends, to champion new voices, and to curate works in ways that propel the art form forward – that make cinema accessible in a project distinct from the requirements of marketing,” said programmers Ariel Esteban Cayer and Mathieu Li-Goyette in a statement announcing the lineup. Other programmers include Olivier Thibodeau, Mélopée B. Montminy and Justine Smith.
The statement continues: “Everywhere, similar questions arise again and again, concerning the streaming ecosystem, the politics of festivals, the lack of funding in the arts, and the limits of the image itself. More than ever, film critics must make a useful contribution to these conversations through their choices. This selection attempts to paint a critical portrait of the world today, grappled with by films of great perspective, ambition, and integrity, no matter whether they are rendered in hushed, soft tones or bursts of DIY anger, or even provocation. As such, this selection of works embodies many of the tensions of the current moment, around questions of austerity, separating fact from fiction, challenging war and colonialism, confronting loss or memory, and bringing people together around the act of creation and its community. We invite you to discover the films, and the connections and conversations they may create when placed together in such a context.”
See the full line-up below.
Twilight (dir. Park Sye-young, South Korea) A man and a dog walk to the tip of the mountain every evening. There is a light that shines at sunset. They are looking for it, but the sun has set, and the forest is deep. (International Premiere)
A Man Imagined (dir. Melanie Shatzky & Brian M. Cassidy, Canada) This immersive documentary is a bracingly intimate and hallucinatory portrait of 67-year-old Lloyd, a man with schizophrenia surviving amidst urban detritus and decay. (Quebec Premiere)
Two Cuckolds Go Swimming (dir. Winston DeGiobbi, Canada) When adult film star Molly Chambers (Deragh Campbell) flies to Cape Breton to visit her mom, she’s forced to examine her own attachments to home in this austere, dream-like drama. (World Premiere)
Super Happy Forever (dir. Kohei Igarashi, Japan, France) Sano tries to find a red cap forgotten five years earlier by his ex-wife. An impeccable seaside melodrama, weaving together the dimensions of love and grief. (Quebec Premiere)
Louis Riel, ou Le ciel touche la terre (dir. Matias Meyer, Canada) Matias Meyer observes and embodies the last days of Metis leader Louis Riel, the essential figure in Canadian history, with an undeniable Bressonian touch. (Canadian Premiere)
Now He Is in the Truth (dir. Roberto Tarazona, Cuba) A camera wanders through the Cuban countryside where the blinding light of faith struggles to fully illuminate an evanescent peasantry. (World Premiere)
Lost Chapters (dir, Lorena Alvarado, Venezuela, U.S.) Ena returns to Venezuela and embarks on a familial search reminiscent of both the intimacy of Akerman and the labyrinthine qualities of Borges. (North American Premiere)
Merman (dir. Ana Lungu, Romania) Ana Lungu examines the male gaze through Romanian archives that capture images of women from WWII until the Revolution. (North American Premiere)
UNDR. (dir. Kamal Aljafari, Palestine, Germany) In his companion piece to A Fidai Film, Aljafari repurposes archival footage to show a Palestinian landscape ceaselessly transformed from the sky. (Canadian Premiere)
Base Station (dir. Park Sye-young and Yeon Ye-ji, South Korea) Two hypochondriac siblings have taken to the mountains to avoid all electromagnetic frequencies in this hypnotic lesson in claustrophobia and the evocative power of light. (International Premiere)
Sept promenades avec Mark Brown (dir. Pierre Creton and Vincent Barré, France) Pierre Creton and Vincent Barré reconnect with the world of plants and flowers by following the paleo-botanist Mark Brown in his ambition to recreate a primordial forest in Normandy. (Quebec Premiere)
Taman-Taman (Park) (dir. So Yo-Hen, Taiwan) Two Indonesian poets meet at Tainan Park and take advantage of the day to write poetry. An astonishing experimental film on the importance of slowing down and the art of speech itself. (North American Premiere)
Let The Red Moon Burn (dir. Ralitsa Doncheva, Canada, Bulgaria) A ghostly ethnographic film shot during the Zheravna Festival of Costume in Bulgaria.
Eephus (dir. Carson Lund, U.S.) As their beloved small-town baseball field is about to be torn down, two dedicated teams face off for a final day of shenanigans. Carson Lund showcases the extent of his love for the game. (Quebec Premiere)
Fujiyama Cotton (dir. Taku Aoyagi, Japan) Emerging documentarian Taku Aoyagi constructs an exemplary documentary on disability and those who care for the land and encourage us to see the world with kindness. (International Premiere)
Mémoire fertile (dir. Michel Khleifi, Palestine, Belgium) The first film shot by a Palestinian director within the borders of the West Bank, Fertile Memory captures essential images of women’s lives under apartheid.
Spiders Web (dir. Frank Dunsten and Ben et Oliver Roberts, Canada) Spider, a 56-years-old man from Toronto, faces new jail time for an assault he committed during a drunken night out. A delirious social drama ensues, foulmouthed and broke. (Quebec Premiere)
Une langue universelle (dir. Matthew Rankin, Canada) An alternative Canada between Tati and Kiarostami, where the common language is Farsi. Matthew Rankin’s latest surreal comedy, between hilarious drollery and bitter disillusionment.
A Shrine (dir. Abdolreza Kahani, Canada, Iran, France) A tired mechanic builds a religious shrine out of imported wood and takes the road, in this subversive DIY film offering an offbeat window into the Iranian community of Quebec. (North American Premiere)